"The poet Percy Bysshe Shelley was fascinated by scientific experiments," writes Patricia Fara in the Introduction to this tale of the strange birth of electrical science, and its emergence from a high-society party trick to a symbol of man's dominance over nature. Fara writes of Benjamin Franklin, of course, but also of possibly lesser-known personnages in such chapters as "Robert Boyle and the Air-pump," "Francis Hauksbee and the Electrical Machine," "Henry and the Torpedo," and "Luigi Balvani and his Frogs."

"Vividly captures the ferment created by the new science of the Enlightenment … Fara deftly shows how new knowledge emerged from a rich mix of improved technology, medical quackery, Continental theorising, religious doubt and scientific rivalry."—New Scientist